Hollow
by PuppyComic
Summary: It hadn't struck me as strange at the time that she hadn't said 'goodnight' or 'see you in the morning' but the thought that that moment, on my first day at camp, the first time I'd seen Annabeth in nearly a year, was going to be the last time I would see Annabeth in a long time hadn't come to me. I hadn't expected it to be a real goodbye. I hadn't expected her to betray me.
1. Chapter 1

**Takes place The Titan's Curse and just after they've reached Camp Half-Blood at the beginning of The Battle of the Labyrinth although, it has changed so that Percy arrived of his own accord and was not with Annabeth, who was already at camp.**

**Update: As someone pointed out, I had gotten a few things mixed up (it's been a good while since I read the early books)! I amended the few factual errors and what not so all should be in order.**

* * *

I hadn't felt right in a long time. The image of Luke falling, of his body at the bottom of the cliff, they haunted me. It was as if every night, as soon as my eyes would close, his face would appear and we were standing at the edge of the cliff and as his body began to fall, I would always hesitate to reach. I was always too late. Every morning, or sometimes in the middle of the night, I would wake with a start. It was a routine now - I would wake, I would convince myself it was not my fault, I would remind myself that he was evil, I would curse myself because he was _dead_ and there was nothing I could do to stop that. But every time there was a small jab almost like a bee sting of worry, or maybe hope, would waver through me as I recalled what Annabeth had said. He wasn't dead. I groaned. I had no time for this, I had to get ready for whatever first day at Camp I was about to have because, being me, it was bound to be eventful.

"Morning Percy," a voice said from the door of my cabin. "When did you arrive?"

"Hey Grover. Last night, Blackjack brought me."

I pulled the covers off me and sat up. He looked sad and I knew why. I could tell he hadn't been sleeping any easier than I had, not since Pan had spoken to him. He sighed and slumped down on an empty bed beside mine.

"I just don't know how to convince them that he spoke to me! They won't listen to me. They think I'm just a stupid, unworthy satyr," he said, before mumbling, "Which I am."

I shook my head and patted his back. "We were all there Grover, we saw him. He spoke to you. You weren't unworthy." I smiled for good measure but he only frowned. "What?"

"Why are you all sweaty?" He glanced around the room before looking back at me wide eyed, "I didn't walk in on y-"

"Oh gods, no!" I cried, going red. "I had a nightmare!"

He sighed with relief, "That's good. I- I mean not good... I mean, you know, better than-"

I waved my hands in embarrassment. "Yeah, yeah, okay let's stop talking about it."

We both laughed and instantly both of our bodies relaxed. It had been a long time since we had had anything to laugh about. I explained my recurring dream and we discussing numerous things including Annabeth who, according to Grover, 'hadn't seemed herself lately'. When I tried to ask more, he shrugged and replied he hadn't been able to get much time alone with her because of the whole Pan thing. After talking Grover headed towards breakfast, giving me time to get a shower and put on clean clothes. A few people greeted me, asked me about my year, but most of them seemed busy or worried. Once I had eaten about as much as I could, I glanced around the Pavilion and noticed Annabeth was nowhere to be seen. I shrugged, it wasn't unlike her to get up early and train. I got up and decided I would go check since I thought it was probably high time I told her about my dreams. It wasn't necessarily because I thought they were significant, it wasn't like I was having my usual 'foreseeing' dreams - I wasn't seeing Luke in the present and, in fact, it had been a long time since I had had any dreams that weren't about Luke falling - but I thought Annabeth would want to know. There was also a small part of me that wanted to see how she reacted, to see if she still cared. The thought angered me a little but I pushed it to the back of my head as I rounded the corner to the arena.

"Annabeth?" I called but there was no reply. There were, however, other people within the large arena training. I went over to one who I recognised as Malcolm, another child of Athena. "Hey, have you see Annabeth?"

He was in the middle of sparring with someone but, being the son of a goddess of wisdom, handicrafts and not to mention, battle strategy, meant it was little effort for him to take a glance at me and even shrug. "Don't think so," he replied as he turned and hit the other trainee in the stomach with the hilt of his sword. The other boy doubled over. "I think I saw her with Chiron this morning," he said while striking the boys back so he fell to the floor. He offered his hand and pulled him up, but not before smiling and telling him he 'did great, but just needed to keep focus' which was ironic since he had just took the boy down without any focus on the fight at all. He turned, giving me his full attention. "I'm pretty sure they were heading towards the Big House. I think Clarisse was with them."

My eyebrows furrowed. Clarisse and Annabeth with Chiron? I would have said Malcolm must have seen wrong but it was unlikely. "Uh, thanks," I said before heading towards the Big House. Just as I reached the front, the door swung open and in front of me was Annabeth, her hair pulled into a ponytail with a braid on one side leading into it. Her grey eyes were wide in surprise and her face was pale, it looked like she hadn't slept in days. "Hey, are you o-" Clarisse appeared from behind her.

"Move it, Seaweed Brain," she grumbled as she pushed me aside.

I didn't even have time to respond before she'd already turned the corner and disappeared from my sight. "What was that about?" I asked as I turned back to Annabeth who had by now dropped the surprise look but still looked as exhausted as she had done even after holding the weight of the sky. "Annabeth, are you okay?"

She nodded, "I'm fine. I, uh, just haven't been getting much sleep lately."

I couldn't blame her. We'd all had a rough year, even more so than usual. "I haven't either, I've been having these dreams."

"About Luke?" She asked, almost perking up and it half made me not want to tell her them. Lie and say I'd been dreaming about puppies, about food, about _anything _but Luke. But I didn't.

"I just keep seeing him falling. Every night. Every time I'm right there in front of him but I take too long to reach for him and he falls."

Annabeth seemed to think about my dream before nodding, as if she understood. "I- I've been having the same sort of dream. Except," she hesitated and shook her head, "It doesn't matter. How have you been anyway? I haven't seen you all year."

It was true. Although we had talked and even mentioned meeting up, it never seemed to work out. There was a point where it nearly happened but suddenly Annabeth changed her mind, she sounded different on the phone, almost worried, but I didn't think too much into it at the time. I thought maybe she'd forgotten to do her chores.

"I'm okay, yeah, nothing too major happened. A cheerleader tried to kill me even before I started school."

A smile appeared on her lips and for a second she looked like her usual self but it slowly faded. "That's not good."

I shook my head but I couldn't help but stare at her. What was wrong? What had happened? I decided not to pry, she looked tired enough without me pestering her. "Uhm, do you want to go train for a bit?"

She nodded, "That'd be good."

By the time we reached the armoury and the arena, the place had pretty much cleared for lunch but we both decided to stay. For once, Annabeth had picked up a sword instead of using her knife. It didn't strike me as too odd, I presumed the thought of using Luke's knife might have pained her. Despite her tiredness and her usual disliking of a sword, she was an amazing fighter. Just like Malcolm had been earlier on in the arena, she was worked effortlessly with the sword. It was as if she knew my every move, knew my every thought and it wouldn't have surprised me if Annabeth was in my mind - she was clever enough to have worked out a way. Still, I was a good match. I liked sparring with Annabeth because, although I could fight for a while with a child of Ares, such as Clarisse, it was more of a challenge when it was a child of Athena, more specifically Annabeth. It wasn't just about being the strongest nor was it necessarily about being the fastest, it was much more about being the smartest. It didn't matter if I was fast enough to strike her in the chest, but it did matter if I was able to see her use it to her advantage and get me in the ribs. She had knocked my sword from my hand several times, and I had knocked hers too. We both came to a truce and, while panting and sweating, headed towards the Pavilion because, as Annabeth had noted, we had fought through lunch and right through to dinner.

"I could do with food," I sighed, wiping away a collection of sweat from my forehead. "Hey, why don't you use a sword my often?" I asked.

She looked like she was about to say something but stopped herself. We were already at the Pavilion and so I knew our conversation would have to stop due to the table rules. "I'll see you after dinner," she said smiling, although it didn't quite seem happy.

I went to my table, gathered my food and slid a small portion into the fire for the gods then sat. Because of my empty table and the obvious lack of conversation I could have, I was only able to think about how Grover had been right, Annabeth was acting strange. She didn't seem at all like herself. It was as if she had been drained of all happiness. I turned to steal a glance at her table and noticed that, although she was participating in conversation, she seemed distracted. I turned back to my food and sighed, maybe Annabeth was finally beginning to accept that Luke was dead. Maybe it would just take some cheering up to get her back to her usual self. I finished my food and settled on the idea that it was duty to cheer her. I headed towards my cabin and gathered a couple things that I had brought with me from home - photos, books, even a bracelet my mother had given me - and put them into a box. Once Annabeth had finished her food and was heading towards her cabin, I grabbed her by the hand.

"Percy?" She looked startled and her face blushed a tiny bit.

I smiled, "I've got stuff to show you."

I pulled her towards the edge of the lake where we both sat down. She looked confused as I pulled showed her the box. I opened it and she peered inside.

"What is it?"

"When we were meant to meet up I was going to show you all this stuff. It's just a few bits and pieces from my year that, uh, erm," I began to feel extremely embarrassed and realised how stupid I must have seemed. I almost went to close the box but Annabeth put her hand over mine.

"Show me."

I felt a warm rush over me. I pulled out a photo first. "This is me and my mum and her new boyfriend."

"Paul," Annabeth said, "You mentioned him a couple times."

I nodded. "He's cool. Mum really likes him, he makes her happy."

"You look happy too," she observed, pointing to the photograph. She looked almost... sad. "Where was it taken?" She asked, shaking the look of sadness from her face.

"At the top of the Empire State Building," I said, though I think she already knew, she just wanted to keep herself speaking. "I didn't take them to the view from the 600th floor though," I added.

Annabeth laughed. "That would have been bad."

There were a few other photographs that had been taken over the course of the year, some from a winter trip, some from day trips. As I went through them, flicking past photos, I came across a photograph of me and a daughter of one of my mothers friends that I didn't recognise and on the back it read, "Have a nice summer Percy!" I blushed and panicked thinking it would only worsen Annabeth's mood but when I looked, she was smiling like she had done earlier, like her usual self.

"I'm glad you had a nice time, Percy."

As strange as it was she hadn't gotten angry, I was happy she was smiling. I showed her a few of the books I had had to read and had brought with me to camp to, her surprise, re-read. "I really liked them, that's all!"

"Percy Jackson, reading? No, _re-reading_?"

"Shut up, they're good!"

For a while we sat and talked, exchanged stories, shared jokes. It was what I had missed most during the year, having someone to talk to, someone who was _easy_ to talk to, someone like Annabeth. Or, rather, though it embarrassed me to admit it, not someone _like _Annabeth, just Annabeth.

"That bracelet is nice," Annabeth said, picking it up. I hadn't even remembered the bracelet until she mentioned it.

"Oh yeah, my mum got it for me. It was from some trip her and Paul took." The bracelet was made of thick string and had small shells intertwined in it. It was nice, but not quite something I'd wear. "You can have it if you'd like."

She looked at me and shook her head, "I can't just take a present you're mum got you."

"You can if I'm giving it to you as a present," I replied as I handed it to her.

She hesitated but took it and slipped it on. "Thank you, Percy." Suddenly she looked sad all over again. "I have to go now."

I nodded, assuming she meant to bed. I got up, dusted myself off and offered my hand. She took it and I pulled her up before we started the walk back to our cabins. Once we were within the horseshoe and had to depart, Annabeth turned to me.

"Percy," she began but wavered, "Thanks... for everything." I must have had a confused look on my face because she continued, "I just mean for being here. For being a friend. For being you."

I wasn't sure how I was meant to reply to that so I merely said 'you're welcome'. She nodded her head and fiddled with the bracelet on her wrist. Her hair had become somewhat messy through the day but it still looked as beautiful as it usually did and although she still looked sad, there was, what looked to me, a small trace of a smile as she looked at me.

"Well I guess I'll see you in the morning," I finally said.

Suddenly the smile dropped and her eyes averted to the ground. After a few seconds she nodded and looked back up at me.

"Goodbye, Percy."

It hadn't struck me as strange at the time that she hadn't said 'goodnight' or 'see you in the morning' but the thought that that moment, on my first day at camp, the first time I'd seen Annabeth in nearly a year, was going to be the last time I would see Annabeth in a long time hadn't come to me. I hadn't expected it to be a real goodbye. I hadn't expected her to betray me.


	2. Sorry

**Sorry I haven't updated, I just moved house! The next chapter will be coming really soon, it's just an issue with Internet atm. I'm sorry the timing of putting this story out was really bad, I wasn't expecting the move to cause this much of a delay!**

**also, someone pm'd asking where my Teen Wolf fic went and the truth is I got bored of my own story. I didnt see much point in continuing when I didn't even know where it was heading so I just deleted. Ill send the documents to anyone who wants to continue it though. My emails jgeorgiaburke . Ill sort an arrangement out over email**


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